Development of intuitive rules: Evaluating the application of the dual-system framework to understanding children’s intuitive reasoning

Theories of adult reasoning propose that reasoning consists of two functionally distinct systems that operate under entirely different mechanisms. This theoretical framework has been used to account for a wide range of phenomena, which now encompasses developmental research on reasoning and problem solving. We begin this review by contrasting three main dual-system theories of adult reasoning (Evans & Over, 1996; Sloman, 1996; Stanovich & West, 2000) with a well-established developmental account that also incorporates a dual-system framework (Brainerd & Reyna, 2001). We use developmental studies of the formation and application of intuitive rules in science and mathematics to evaluate the claims that these theories make. Overall, the evidence reviewed suggests that what is crucial to understanding how children reason is the saliency of the features that are presented within a task. By highlighting the importance of saliency as a way of understanding reasoning, we aim to provide clarity concerning the benefits and limitations of adopting a dual-system framework to account for evidence from developmental studies of intuitive reasoning.

[1]  Vladimir M. Sloutsky,et al.  When Development and Learning Decrease Memory , 2004, Psychological science.

[2]  Norman H. Anderson,et al.  Function knowledge: Comment on Reed and Evans. , 1987 .

[3]  R. Stavy,et al.  Cognitive conflict as a basis for teaching quantitative aspects of the concept of temperature , 1980 .

[4]  Robert S. Siegler,et al.  Learning About Learning , 2004 .

[5]  Jeffrey K. Liker,et al.  A day at the races: A study of IQ, expertise, and cognitive complexity. , 1986 .

[6]  Robert S. Siegler,et al.  A comparison of the geometric reasoning of students attending Israeli ultraorthodox and mainstream schools , 1997 .

[7]  Keith E. Stanovich,et al.  Individual differences in rational thought. , 1998 .

[8]  R. Siegler.  Strategic development , 1999, Trends in Cognitive Sciences.

[9]  Jonathan Evans,et al.  Rationality and reasoning , 1996 .

[10]  C. Moore,et al.  The Developmental Role of Intuitive Principles in Choosing Mathematical Strategies. , 1996 .

[11]  M. Osman.  An evaluation of dual-process theories of reasoning , 2004, Psychonomic bulletin & review.

[12]  K. Stanovich,et al.  Heuristic and analytic processing: age trends and associations with cognitive ability and cognitive styles. , 2002, Journal of experimental child psychology.

[13]  David W. Carraher,et al.  Mathematics in the streets and in schools , 1985 .

[14]  L. E. Klopfer,et al.  Factors influencing the learning of classical mechanics , 1980 .

[15]  D. Wentura,et al.  Dissociative affective and associative priming effects in the lexical decision task: yes versus no responses to word targets reveal evaluative judgment tendencies. , 2000, Journal of experimental psychology. Learning, memory, and cognition.

[16]  Jeremy M Wolfe,et al.  Modeling the role of parallel processing in visual search , 1990, Cognitive Psychology.

[17]  A. Karmiloff-Smith.  From meta-processes to conscious access: Evidence from children's metalinguistic and repair data , 1986, Cognition.

[18]  D. Tirosh,et al.  Intuitive rules in science and mathematics: the case of ‘more of A ‐‐ more of B’ , 1996 .

[19]  David Moshman,et al.  : From inference to reasoning: The construction of rationality , 2004 .

[20]  Barbara Anne Dosher,et al.  Judgments of semantic and episodic relatedness: Common time-course and failure of segregation , 1991 .

[21]  J. Piaget,et al.  Child's Conception Of Geometry , 1960 .

[22]  K. R. Hammond.  Human judgment and social policy , 1980 .

[23]  Kyle R Cave,et al.  Roles of salience and strategy in conjunction search. , 2002, Journal of experimental psychology. Human perception and performance.

[24]  John R. Anderson,et al.  Rules of the Mind , 1993 .

[25]  M. E. R..  “If” , 1921, Definitions.

[26]  L. Schauble,et al.  Beyond Modularity: A Developmental Perspective on Cognitive Science. , 1994 .

[27]  M. Hoffman,et al.  Review of Child Development Research , 1966 .

[28]  Ruth Stavy,et al.  How Students Mis/Understand Science and Mathematics: Intuitive Rules (Ways of Knowing in Science Series) , 2000 .

[29]  K. Crowley,et al.  The microgenetic method. A direct means for studying cognitive development. , 1991, The American psychologist.

[30]  D. Tirosh,et al.  Intuitive rules in science and mathematics: the case of ‘Everything can be divided by two’ , 1996 .

[31]  D. Kahneman,et al.  Heuristics and Biases: The Psychology of Intuitive Judgment , 2002 .

[32]  John K. Gilbert,et al.  Concepts, Misconceptions and Alternative Conceptions: Changing Perspectives in Science Education , 1983 .

[33]  C. Moore,et al.  Characterizing the intuitive representation in problem solving: Evidence from evaluating mathematical strategies , 1997, Memory & cognition.

[34]  K. Cave,et al.  Top-down and bottom-up attentional control: On the nature of interference from a salient distractor , 1999, Perception & psychophysics.

[35]  Ruth Stavy,et al.  Using analogy to overcome misconceptions about conservation of matter , 1991 .

[36]  W. James,et al.  The Principles of Psychology. , 1983 .

[37]  Rina Zazkis,et al.  Prime decomposition: Understanding uniqueness , 1996 .

[38]  S. R. Campbell,et al.  Divisibility and Multiplicative Structure of Natural Numbers: Preservice Teachers' Understanding. , 1996 .

[39]  Dina Tirosh,et al.  The role of representations in students’ intuitive thinking about infinity , 1996 .

[40]  John J. Clement,et al.  The Role of Extreme Case Reasoning in Instruction for Conceptual Change , 1997 .

[41]  S. Sloman.  Two systems of reasoning. , 2002 .

[42]  Valerie F. Reyna,et al.  Fuzzy-Trace Theory and Framing Effects in Children's Risky Decision Making , 1994 .

[43]  Eric A. Jenkins,et al.  How Children Discover New Strategies , 1989 .

[44]  A. Tversky,et al.  Extensional versus intuitive reasoning: the conjunction fallacy in probability judgment , 1983 .

[45]  V. Reyna,et al.  Fuzzy-trace theory: An interim synthesis , 1995 .

[46]  E. Fischbein,et al.  Intuition in science and mathematics , 1987 .

[47]  B. Dosher.  Discriminating preexperimental (semantic) from learned (episodic) associations: A speed-accuracy study , 1984, Cognitive Psychology.

[48]  A. Anastasi.  Individual differences. , 2020, Annual review of psychology.

[49]  Ruth Stavy,et al.  Intuitive Rules: A way to Explain and Predict Students’ Reasoning , 1999 .

[50]  V. Reyna,et al.  Explaining “Memory Free” Reasoning 1 , 1992 .

[51]  Ruth Stavy,et al.  Intuitive Interference in Probabilistic Reasoning , 2006 .

[52]  C. Moore,et al.  Development of intuitive and numerical proportional reasoning , 1992 .

[53]  J. Wolfe.  Asymmetries in visual search: An introduction , 2001, Perception & psychophysics.

[54]  V. Reyna,et al.  Fuzzy-trace theory: dual processes in memory, reasoning, and cognitive neuroscience. , 2001, Advances in child development and behavior.

[55]  Ruth Stavy,et al.  When analogy is perceived as such , 1993 .

[56]  Ruth Stavy,et al.  Intuitive rules in science and mathematics: a reaction time study , 2006 .

[57]  R. Siegler,et al.  A comparison of the geometric reasoning of students attending Israeli ultraorthodox and mainstream schools. , 1997, Developmental psychology.

[58]  B. Remmo Hamel,et al.  On the Conservation of Liquids. , 1971 .

[59]  Ruth Stavy,et al.  Intuitive Rules and Comparison Tasks , 1999 .

[60]  T. Salthouse,et al.  Processing speed as a mental capacity. , 1994, Acta psychologica.

[61]  Dirk Wentura,et al.  Underlying processes in the implicit association test: dissociating salience from associations. , 2004, Journal of experimental psychology. General.

[62]  Ruma Falk,et al.  A potential for learning probability in young children , 1980 .

[63]  Charles J. Brainerd,et al.  FALSE-RECOGNITION REVERSAL: WHEN SIMILARITY IS DISTINCTIVE , 1995 .

[64]  V. Reyna,et al.  Inclusion illusions: Fuzzy-trace theory and perceptual salience effects in cognitive development , 1990 .

[65]  John G. Seamon,et al.  Repetition can have similar or different effects on accurate and false recognition , 2002 .

[66]  J. Wolfe.  Moving towards solutions to some enduring controversies in visual search , 2003, Trends in Cognitive Sciences.

[67]  John J. Clement,et al.  Using Bridging Analogies and Anchoring Institutions to Seal with Students' Preconceptions in Physics , 1993 .

[68]  K. Stanovich,et al.  Heuristics and Biases: Individual Differences in Reasoning: Implications for the Rationality Debate? , 2002 .

[69]  Yoav Yair,et al.  “Everything comes to an end”: An intuitive rule in physics and mathematics , 2004 .

[70]  O. John,et al.  Automatic vigilance: the attention-grabbing power of negative social information. , 1991, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[71]  Eyal M Reingold,et al.  Saccadic inhibition in reading. , 2004, Journal of experimental psychology. Human perception and performance.

[72]  M. Kinsbourne,et al.  Divergent Thinking Styles of the Hemispheres: How Syllogisms Are Solved during Transitory Hemisphere Suppression , 1996, Brain and Cognition.

[73]  R. Siegler.  Three aspects of cognitive development , 1976, Cognitive Psychology.

[74]  R. Stavy,et al.  1 – U-Shaped Behavioral Growth in Ratio Comparisons1 , 1982 .

[75]  G. Hall,et al.  The Interpretation of Dreams , 1914, Nature.

[76]  Leslie B. Cohen,et al.  Beyond U-Shaped Development in Infants' Processing of Faces: An Information-Processing Account , 2004 .

[77]  R. Stavy,et al.  U-shaped behavioral growth , 1982 .

[78]  Vinod Goel,et al.  Intuitive interference in quantitative reasoning , 2006, Brain Research.

[79]  G. Logan,et al.  The Development of Selective Inhibitory Control Across the Life Span , 2002, Developmental neuropsychology.

[80]  Peter Bryant,et al.  Perception and Understanding in Young Children: An Experimental Approach , 1974 .

[81]  S. Freud.  The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud , 1953 .

[82]  Ian Dennis,et al.  : Working memory, inhibitory control and the development of children's reasoning , 2004 .

[83]  D. Davidson,et al.  The Representativeness Heuristic and the Conjunction Fallacy Effect in Children's Decision Making. , 1995 .

[84]  D. Schacter,et al.  The Evolution of Multiple Memory Systems , 1987 .

[85]  A. Karmiloff-Smith.  Précis of Beyond modularity: A developmental perspective on cognitive science , 1994, Behavioral and Brain Sciences.

[86]  R. Stavy,et al.  Children's conception of changes in the state of matter: From solid to liquid. , 1985 .

[87]  G. Winer,et al.  On the uncertainty of conservation: Responses to misleading conservation questions. , 1993 .

[88]  R. Siegler,et al.  Conscious and unconscious strategy discoveries: a microgenetic analysis. , 1998, Journal of experimental psychology. General.

[89]  K. Crowley,et al.  Explanation and generalization in young children's strategy learning. , 1999, Child development.

[90]  D. Wentura,et al.  Automatic vigilance: the attention-grabbing power of approach- and avoidance-related social information. , 2000, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[91]  R. French,et al.  Implicit learning and consciousness: A graded, dynamic perspective , 2002 .

[92]  E. Fischbein,et al.  The Evolution with Age of Probabilistic, Intuitively Based Misconceptions. , 1997 .

[93]  P. Klaczynski.  Analytic and heuristic processing influences on adolescent reasoning and decision-making. , 2001, Child development.

[94]  Rina Zazkis.  Intuitive rules in number theory: Example of ‘The more of A, the more of B’ rule implementation , 1999 .

[95]  S. Sloman.  The empirical case for two systems of reasoning. , 1996 .

[96]  James A Dixon,et al.  Redescription disembeds relations: Evidence from relational transfer and use in problem solving , 2003, Memory & cognition.

[97]  G. Winer,et al.  Adults' failure on misleading weight-conservation tests: A developmental analysis. , 1992 .

[98]  James Strachey,et al.  The Interpretation of Dreams. , 1954 .

[99]  Dominique Lamy,et al.  Effects of task relevance and stimulus-driven salience in feature-search mode. , 2004, Journal of experimental psychology. Human perception and performance.

[100]  G. Pagnoni,et al.  Human Striatal Responses to Monetary Reward Depend On Saliency , 2004, Neuron.

[101]  A. S. Gilinsky,et al.  Working memory and bias in reasoning across the life span. , 1994, Psychology and aging.

[102]  D. Amso,et al.  Conditions under which young children can hold two rules in mind and inhibit a prepotent response. , 2002, Developmental psychology.

[103]  A. Lleras,et al.  Spatial context and top-down strategies in visual search. , 2004, Spatial vision.

[104]  Charles J. Brainerd,et al.  Dropping the Other U: An Alternative Approach to U-Shaped Developmental Functions , 2004 .

[105]  Richard Gunstone,et al.  The fluid/gravity correspondence , 2011, 1107.5780.

[106]  Vladimir M Sloutsky,et al.  Is a picture worth a thousand words? The flexible nature of modality dominance in young children. , 2004, Child development.

[107]  A Treisman,et al.  Feature binding, attention and object perception. , 1998, Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences.

[108]  W. N. Schoenfeld,et al.  Principles of Psychology , 2007 .

[109]  A. Tversky,et al.  Subjective Probability: A Judgment of Representativeness , 1972 .

[110]  Susan L. Franzel,et al.  Guided search: an alternative to the feature integration model for visual search. , 1989, Journal of experimental psychology. Human perception and performance.

[111]  V. Reyna,et al.  Memory independence and memory interference in cognitive development. , 1993, Psychological review.

[112]  P A Klaczynski,et al.  Personal theories, intellectual ability, and epistemological beliefs: adult age differences in everyday reasoning biases. , 2000, Psychology and aging.